


The Line Will Not End Here

by XLcatloveress



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Past Brainwashing, Past Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-18
Updated: 2020-11-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:48:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27620921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XLcatloveress/pseuds/XLcatloveress
Summary: A rescue mission. Straight into a trap. But what wouldn't Steve do for a .. friend.A close friend.A dear friend.A .. friend.A vaguely handwaved AU-setting, mainly to not force me to be canon-compliant.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Kudos: 3





	The Line Will Not End Here

**Author's Note:**

> This is chapter 1/3, written as a thank you to an amazing person who would help out two complete strangers just because a mutual friend asked for it. It was meant to be short and sweet -- I hope it will at least still succeed with being sweet in the end. Apparently, writing just needed to happen. 
> 
> Still .. thank you. Thank you, kind stranger, for your compassion and for your aid. You wouldn't let me repay you monetarily, so please accept this meager offering as my thanks.

A minimal change in atmospheric pressure – something so small and easily missed that later, he would express surprise over even having picked up on it –was Steve’s only warning. He pressed the communicator button located conveniently in the palm of his leather glove, part of the standard issue tactical OPS uniform he was wearing, and connected with the network. Com silence be damned.

Before he could get a word out, he was dropped to all fours with a gasp. All air left his lungs, a sensation like a steel-booted kick to his solar plexus rippling through his body, stealing his breath. It felt like a creature attempting to claw its way out of his chest, tearing at tissue in its wake. 

That was when the sound .. started? Became obvious? Gained in volume?

Gasping for breath, Steve shook his head to dislodge the piercing sound that stabbed at his brain, tore through his thinking, made him want to dig his eyeballs out so that he could dislodge it from where it seemed to sit and reverberate right above the bridge of his nose. 

What .. what was .. what was happening? He needed .. he was .. he .. he had been .. on a mission. He needed to .. He was on a _mission_. 

The world around him shattered, sound and pressure and realization coalescing into one fraction of a moment as it was sundered, sending Steve hurtling backward before he impacted heavily with the wall.

**Bucky!**

Tense muscles going limp, this thought, that _name_ , was the last before Steve’s consciousness was swallowed by a surge of all-encompassing, unrelenting black.  
*************  
A room filled with people. People from very different backgrounds, with very different agendas. Not all of them military, but all of them gathered by a military organization for covert military concerns. Each one of them with their own questions, their own concerns, their own parcel of knowledge they could bring to the table, if tapped into correctly. 

There were some universal constants that never changed, no matter what time you came from or what time you were living in. And while Steve still felt severely displaced in a lot of matters, he knew _this_. Sitting in a room, observing, listening, getting briefed on special ops. He _knew_ this. It fit like a comfortable, well-worn glove, one that he had worn for what felt like all of his life (or at least the part of it that counted). Yes, the gadgets and gizmos surrounding them might be different, far more glitzy and glamorous and shiny than anything he had known in his time of active duty, but sitting here, he felt at home. At ease. He knew this, and he knew without a doubt that he too could bring his parcel of knowledge to this table. Modern gadgets and gizmos weren’t everything, he knew from experience – there were times when even the best and most modern technology failed. There was something to be said for the old-fashioned approach at times – and if he could do _anything_ , then it was old-fashioned. After all, wasn’t that his shtick? 

For the time being though, he had chosen to sit back and observe. Sitting in his best straight-backed at-ease pose, looking at once relaxed and sufficiently military, his keen eyes canvassed the room, taking in tactical information on everyone present. Some he knew better than others, but all told, in any tactical briefing, it was never a bad idea to re-assess who had also been brought into the planning.

Anthony Stark, son of Howard Stark, and the world’s most prolific inventor. 

Natasha Romanoff, a world class spy and assassin with a knack for slipping into any role her jobs might require of her. 

Bruce Banner, a scientist of world renown with a hulky little secret he’d much rather keep eternally hidden. 

Clint Barton, a marksman of circus backgrounds with the acrobat skills to show for it and the keenest eye Steve had ever encountered. 

Sam Wilson, dependable wing-man and knowledgeable in everything HYDRA in general and Project Star-Spangled Banner in particular. Sometimes, it chafed a bit, knowing himself to have been studied in such close detail by a mere stranger. A friend now, certainly, but .. not when Sam had been assigned Steve as his personal project.

To round out their little military get-together, there was Nicholas Fury and his right-hand woman, Mariah Hill, as well as Phillip Coulson, introduced merely as ‘Agent’ though Steve was certain there was more to the unassuming man than just a mere everyday agent of SHIELD. He didn’t have the bearings of a man who was a ‘mere agent’. What he _did_ have the bearings of was someone very interested in Steve, to a point where it had a touch of hero worship, something that made Steve a hint uncomfortable. 

All of these considerations fell away when Fury began to speak, Steve’s full attention trained with utmost alacrity on the man in charge. Be a good soldier, the brass tack was speaking.

And what monumental things Fury was speaking of!

HYDRA, and inhumane experimentation, and danger for the free world. 

It was then that Steve allowed his attention to flicker to the other occupants of this briefing room. 

In Natasha’s reaction he saw that HYDRA was dangerous. They meant business. They were powerful enough to strike fear into a hardened assassin’s heart.

In Banner’s reaction he saw that the situation was wrought with danger, that HYDRA was on to something in those experimentations Fury was discussing.

In Anthony’s reaction he saw that time was, while not of the utmost essence, but at least short. War was about to be waged on a level that was unheard of before. Earth as a whole was in peril. 

It was Sam’s reaction that stood out to him the most. In Sam’s reaction he saw that they were not given the whole picture. Details, small enough to not seem to matter, were missing to the puzzle that was being laid out before them. HYDRA wasn’t new around the block, they were ancient – why would they attack now? What had changed for them to feel confident enough to stage their attack at this particular time? Had they been raising an army? Had they developed a weapon? 

And then, it dropped like a bomb. 

A name.

“James Buchanan Barnes.”

The Winter Soldier. HYDRA’s experimentation, its confidence, its army, its weapon.

His friend. 

His .. friend.

“I’m going in.”  
*************  
_’You will be walking straight into a trap!’_ , Clint had said, the motions of his hands cut and dry as they underlined his words. 

_’You **are** walking straight into a trap!’_, Sam had chimed in, his set features betraying that he already knew what Steve would do regardless of anyones’ concerns. 

Of _course_ he was walking into a trap. The information SHIELD had extracted to allow a tracking of their efforts was all but an invitation for Steve to bring them the only living specimen of the Serum. It couldn’t have been more clear had an actual paper invitation arrived, with a pretty red ribbon tying it all up into a bow.

But the mere fact that the situation was a set-up and that Steve knew about it didn’t change the fact that he still had to go and do what was right. Because trap or no trap, he had long since given a promise. A promise that he was not about to consider breaking now.

To the end of the line.

 _.. and apparently, beyond._  
*************  
Steve woke with a gasp, the nauseating sound no longer tearing through his skull, the atmospheric pressure stable, at least for the moment. 

“Bucky.”


End file.
